Having just viewed Karson’s gavel I was struck by the colour. My question: Is the colour in the picture fairly accurate ?If so, how readily available is this wood?I ask because I have plans for an old Cadillac that is just begging for something like this.TIA, John

-- If we learn from our mistakes, I'm getting a fantastic education.

8 replies so far

Osage Orange is what we call Hedge Apple Trees. They were planted along the edges of farm fields as wind breaks and hedge rows. There are still quite a few around here in Central Illinois, but they are slowly diminishing. The color is a bright orange yellow when first milled, but will darken and turn brownish with exposure to UV.

MrWoody: while I’m not sure about the availability, the osage orange tree is native to Arkansas, Texas, and Oklahoma and is a prized component of recurve and long bows because of it’s tough resilient nature. Because it’s a spindly and often multi trunked, I’m guessing you’re only going to find smaller pieces. I was able to find some on ebay. Hope this helps.

Thank you all. Toyguy the link was very informative. I don’t think I’ll bother searching for this stuff. The colour change is something I wouldn’t want. I guess the plans go back on the shelf until I come up with another idea.

I have it in my yard and have used it for many of my projects posted here on LJ… Take a look, lots of different colors. I have some different size logs if you want to pay for shipping you can have some.

It’s a beautiful wood, and I just now managed to get some “apples” from a hedgerow dating from the 1800’s here in northern IL, and I plan to grow some seedlings using the period practice of creating a winter slurry from the apples, then planting the slurry in the spring. The colors of the wood are as beautiful as you would ever hope for, and the color change regarding UV is controllable, first of all, if this is an indoor piece, most glass blocks out most UV, or at least the kind that would cause the darkening action in osage…and secondly, there are finishes designed to protect wood colors from UV for outdoor uses. It’s a relative of the Mulberry, also easy to grow around here, and somewhat available up where you are, although recently canada listed that as endangered due to a fungal ailment… Mulberry starts off even lighter than osage, but often turns very much darker, at least with the wood I’ve been working with thus far. Both woods are very hard, difficult to cut, but make great anythings. Also, rot resistant and weather resistant, as noted by others.